


a state of flux (and tofurkey)

by mostlyunstablefangirl



Category: Glee
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F, trigger warning for gay panic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:42:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24534019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mostlyunstablefangirl/pseuds/mostlyunstablefangirl
Summary: “It’s a barbaric holiday, but my dads and I acknowledge that it signals appreciation for each other, and we’ve actually initiated celebrations of diversity with our family friends. Oh, you’d love my Aunt Trudy -- she’s not actually my aunt. She’s a modern, independent woman like you, and she lost a baby in high school, too. She’s got a great sense of--”“I’ll go if you shut up.”
Relationships: Rachel Berry/Quinn Fabray
Comments: 3
Kudos: 156





	a state of flux (and tofurkey)

“Berry!” Quinn snaps. “How many times do I have to tell you? Don’t dry your frumpy  _ fucking  _ sweaters over my chair!”

“You weren’t even awake yet, Quinn,” Rachel reasons. “I was going to move them before you woke.”

“Well, I’m awake.”

Rachel fusses further, tutting as she hangs the various articles in her college-issued wardrobe. 

“Kurt told me that you don’t have Thanksgiving plans,” she says, in her matter-of-fact way. The way that Quinn  _ so  _ hates.

Despite her missing some social cues, Quinn has never locked Rachel out of their room or purposely ignored the girl’s questioning. She begrudgingly responds.

“I don’t really get along with either of my parents,” Quinn mutters. Getting pregnant your sophomore year of high school, when you have extremely Catholic parents, will do that. Quinn isn’t about to detail that past for Rachel, though.

Aside from the brunette  _ once  _ holding Quinn’s hair while she sobbed over a dormitory toilet, she and Rachel aren’t that close. Their few months together, randomly paired by NYADA’s dorm-buddy system, have found them with few common interests besides singing.

“I was thinking,” Rachel hedges, and Quinn’s stomach drops, “that you might like to come home with me for the occasion.”

“Listen--”

“It’s a  _ barbaric  _ holiday, but my dads and I acknowledge that it signals appreciation for each other, and we’ve actually initiated celebrations of diversity with our family friends. Oh, you’d  _ love  _ my Aunt Trudy -- she’s not actually my aunt. She’s a modern, independent woman like you, and she lost a baby in high school, too. She’s got a great sense of--”

Quinn finally registers what Rachel is saying, and with horror realizes that her background may not be as hidden as she hoped. “I’ll go if you shut up.”

After all, what is Quinn going to do over the weekend in a nearly-empty dormitory? Let the sleazy RA flirt with her in hopes that he’ll pass her his flask?

Rachel grins widely and mimes the zipping of her lips. She skips out of the room, her miniskirt flouncing behind her, and Quinn pretends not to notice the extra margin of thigh that it reveals.

For some reason, it’s disconcerting to her that Rachel’s fathers have wedding photos strung up in every corner of the house, including the hallway leading to Rachel’s suite.

They greet both girls with hugs. Quinn instinctively accepts, but once each embrace is over, draws her elbows into her sides with a strange chill.

“They put your stuff in my room -- I can always move you to the guest room if you want, but you’re welcome to stay in here with me, too. Whichever is more comfortable for you.”

The room is done up in pinks and lace and frills -- typical. The vanity by the window has legitimate light bulbs around the mirror, and the bed is a queen with an abundance of decorative pillows. Papier-mache star lanterns adorn the popcorn-textured ceiling, a lighter pastel than the walls’ magenta. 

“Can I stay with you?” Quinn asks hesitantly. Her fear of this new environment, including Leroy and Hiram’s gung-ho nature, is stronger than her aversion to Berry Cooties.

“Yeah, we can watch movies before bed! I’ll bet you’ve never seen  _ Calendar Girls _ \-- am I correct?”

“You sure are,” Quinn groans, pulling a new shirt from her bag. The train ride was taxing, and she has to admit she’s a bit sweaty.

Rachel seems to watch the path of her hand into the duffel. Then, abruptly, an odd look comes over her and she turns away to face the wall.

Goosebumps rise on Quinn’s skin. Does Rachel sense  _ it  _ in her? The secret stirring that she can’t seem to keep? No, Rachel has two dads and wouldn’t easily be made uncomfortable by that. Would she?

So, Quinn hasn’t kissed a girl.

She’s seen it. She’s thought about it. Hell, she even has her Tinder preferences set to… Well, she did, before she deleted the app and threw her phone haphazardly across the room.

What’s one more sinful attribute, at this point? But it’s not like she’s going to tell anyone about it. Besides, if she’s bi, which she is heavily asserting that she must be, she can marry a man and no one will ever know.

That was one of the factors that led to Berry holding her hair and making absurdly-comforting cooing noises in their communal restroom. Quinn stopped dead in her tracks in the middle of a party, watching two girls go at it -- albeit, probably for male attention -- on a sofa and decided to get more wasted than she’d ever been.

And cry about it later. With a very petite, shrill drama student combing equally-petite fingers through her hair.

At the mention of  _ Calendar Girls _ , Leroy and Hiram demand inclusion. That is precisely what leads to the four of them in the living room, the grown men pressed together on one couch and Quinn and Rachel on their respective ends of another couch.

Quinn, at first, is able to ignore how the men sling arms around each other, whisper commentary into each other’s ears.

Rachel curls her legs up onto the chair, donning another characteristic miniskirt. Quinn notices the proportional, smooth legs that match her olive complexion. They fold neatly under her.

Quinn shakes her head and tries to return to the movie. She’s already forgotten the plot.

Dinner is more pleasant than Quinn expects, though she’s grilled with questions about her major, her sister, and her childhood pets. She chokes at every instance where she has to reveal that her upbringing was less than ideal, but the two nod in understanding where she trails off about her father. Do they know? How could they know?

Is this friendship? Quinn doesn’t have a lot of friends at college, admittedly, where Rachel has boatloads. There’s one girl she frequents parties with, an eternally bored-looking blonde with cakey mascara. There’s Kurt, her and Rachel’s accidental mutual friend. Kurt is a barista in the coffee shop below their dormitory. And then there’s Rachel, the only person so far who’s invited Quinn into their home.

Leroy and Hiram skirt around the gaps, where information that she’s given them about herself is lacking. And they do it in unison, working around each other, as if delving deeper without prodding her.

She dreams that night that she’s this big, gaping hole in a blanket, and Leroy and Hiram turn into Cinderella’s mice. They scurry with lengths of string, duck under and through each other’s trails, weave in and out and across. They do this until the hole is replaced by a big, colorful spider web of yarn. And when the dream-view pans up and over the blanket, the knitting is done in the image of a smiling Rachel.

Quinn wakes up on Thanksgiving morning first, her breath stirring the wisps of hair on the nape of the neck directly in front of her face.

_ Wait, what? _

Quinn, used to cradling a pillow between her legs in sleep, stiffens suddenly at the realization that she’s doing it to something decidedly  _ not  _ a pillow.

Rachel Berry is that something. Rachel Berry, all five foot, two inches of her, is cradled in the crescent Quinn’s body formed in sleep. Rachel Berry’s leg tangled with one of hers. One of her quadriceps pillowing the back of one of Rachel Berry’s thighs. Rachel Berry. Rachel Berry!

Quinn snatches her arm back as if she’s been burned.

Rachel shifts with a whimper, and reaches backward with her own hand, as if to search for the offending limb.  _ Fuck _ . Quinn should’ve known by the lack of even exhales that Rachel was awake.

“Rachel?” Quinn chances, in as low a voice as she can muster. “I’m not--”

Rachel turns partially, shoulder blades flat to the bed, to look at her.

Quinn doesn’t know why her breath catches.

Rachel’s look is...off-putting. Eyes wide and innocent.

Her intended declaration of  _ I’m not gay _ dies in her throat, because it wouldn’t be true. She’s known it deep down, and it bubbles up to the surface when she impulsively leans over to press her lips to Rachel’s.

If Quinn is a carelessly-lit match, Rachel is a wildfire. With the simplest pressure of Quinn’s lips, Rachel rises up to meet her. Before Quinn knows it, Rachel is reversing their positions to straddle the taller girl’s chest.

Their kisses are wet, and Rachel’s lips are fuller than any guy’s she’s ever been with. Rachel seems to be in a frenzy, tongue dipping into Quinn’s mouth. She rocks her pelvis into Quinn’s belly, bracing herself on her hands at either side of Quinn’s head, her hair cascading down to curtain their faces. And fuck, that’s--that’s…

Wrong. Bad. Quinn shoves blindly at the hips on top of her, swallowing an excess of saliva and the beginnings of sickness in her throat.

_ You don’t even  _ like _ Rachel _ , Quinn chastises herself.  _ Are you that much of a perv, that you can’t help yourself around a person who simply has a butt and boobs? A  _ teeny,  _ irritating person, no less? _

Rachel looks crestfallen, sitting back on her heels. “Quinn? Did I do something?”

Quinn shakes her head vigorously, avoiding her gaze.  _ No. I did. _

Quinn is determined to ignore Rachel wherever she can, for the rest of the day. This proves hard because Leroy and Hiram ask them to collaborate in the kitchen, basting the tofurkey.

It sucks that family time with the Berrys is still pleasant, despite disavowal of eye contact with their daughter. It makes the whole situation even more fucked-up. That she’s happy to cut whatever veggies Hiram asks her to (because Rachel is apparently not allowed in the vicinity of knives). That Leroy tells her she looks  _ lovely  _ in her babydoll dress.

Rachel looks miserable.

She perks a little bit when she answers the door for the first guest -- Leroy’s brother, Marcus. A large man, he scoops Rachel up effortlessly.

Quinn is once again reminded just how  _ small  _ Rachel is, and tears spring unbidden to her eyes. What the  _ fuck  _ is that? She chalks it up to hormones.

Rachel tries to approach her in multiple instances, but Quinn steadfastly stutters excuses, skirts her, and refuses to look up from any task. Rachel attempts to get her attention by trailing fingers across the back of her hand, but immediately stops when she sees Quinn shudder.

The rest of the time, it’s just puppy dog eyes. Which are  _ annoying _ .

Other gay couples arrive and it’s hard for Quinn to not feel panic and nausea rise up from somewhere deep, and old.

The one called Aunt Trudy arrives, with her  _ wife _ , and cropped hair. Rachel must hear Quinn’s sharp intake of breath. 

Of course, at dinner, Quinn is fascinated with them in a twisted way. She hates herself for peeking at them through her hair.

Why does she care? She’s not going to marry a woman.

Why can’t she ignore that Aunt Trudy’s wife is shorter than Aunt Trudy, and louder, and bubblier?

It comes to a head when Rachel grasps Quinn’s hand under the table. Quinn jumps, knee contacting the underneath of the wooden surface. She hisses  _ ow,  _ before realizing that everyone has gone quiet, their motion not undetected.

Her face hot, Quinn mutters an apology and pushes away from the table. She retreats to the darkness of the upstairs and slides down one wall, hyperventilating.

“Sweetie?” Leroy prompts, appearing in the golden halo of light where the stairs kiss the landing.

“I’m sorry,” Quinn gasps, and maybe it means  _ Sorry for interrupting dinner _ , but it’s more like  _ Sorry for upsetting your daughter. _

“You’re all right,” Leroy murmurs, and she can tell he also means it in more ways than one. He eases himself down to sit cross-legged beside her.

She gulps air in the silence.

“You know, the first time I went home with Hiram, I wasn’t out to my family. My father was a menace, said all kinds of awful things about gay people. I was in a bad place for most of my teenage years -- I still have the scars to prove it.”

“What about Hiram?” Quinn asks quietly, grateful for the distraction.

“Oh, his mother was the most amazing woman you’d ever met. Highly religious, but she used that religion to love everybody. She woulda liked you a lot.”

Quinn can’t fathom how he could say that, after a day of knowing her. Hell, she can’t fathom how anyone would like her after a decade of knowing her -- her family sure didn’t. She hugs her biceps hard to her sternum.

“What I’m trying to say, Quinn, is that there are people out there who love you more than you’ll ever know. And people who are going to love you that much. Don’t matter where you come from, what you’ve done, what you  _ think  _ you’ve done.”

A sob escapes Quinn at that last line.

“You have a place with us here, Quinn, whenever you want it. And you have a special place in my daughter’s heart, I can tell you that right now.”

Quinn nods, feeling gross with the snot impeding her breathing.

“Are you ready to have some dinner? I know you’re hungry, miss bell-pepper-thief.”

Quinn laughs earnestly and takes his proffered hand.

Rachel looks distraught. Upon arrival at the dinner table, Quinn tries to give her a sheepish smile. 

Relieved at any sign from Quinn, Rachel’s shoulders sag back to a relaxed position. She beams with at least half her usual candor and passes Quinn the tofurkey.

After dinner, they all drink wine and play games. Quinn turns out to be expertly endowed at Balderdash, and frequently stumps Rachel. Rachel gets a little tipsy and falls over herself in giggles.

When the guests leave, Rachel’s fathers wave their hands at their attempts to clean up the mess, saying it’s best for them all to leave it for the morning.

Rachel turns to Quinn, and Quinn winces at the impending sincerity of Rachel’s tone. “While I’d like you to stay with me, I can completely understand if you’d prefer the guest room.”

“I’m fine to stay with you again, Rachel,” Quinn says honestly.

Rachel nods once, then leads the way upstairs.

She changes in the bathroom at the same time that she brushes her teeth, and Quinn is almost disappointed.

Quinn does the same, and Rachel waits perched on the edge of the bed, lost in thought.

When they wake up in the morning spooning, Quinn retreats -- to Rachel’s dismay -- only to resume holding Rachel after she’s grabbed her phone. They stay still, Quinn pretending to scroll through her most recent notifications and wondering if her heartbeat is noticeable against Rachel’s back.

_ I need time _ , Quinn eventually types into the Notes folder of her phone.

Rachel nods against her collarbone.

“I’m not...out,” Quinn says slowly in their dorm room weeks later. “Yet. Or quite okay with myself, yet.”

“Of course. I understand that things haven’t always been ideal for you.”

“I don’t know what I want, and it’s a miracle that I’m even able to verbalize that right now. Honestly, before Thanksgiving, I thought I was going to marry a man and forget all about, you know, wanting girls.”

Rachel cringes, nods in understanding.

“But you’re really small and bad at taking care of yourself. And I think it’s cute, sometimes. When it’s not absolutely annoying. I notice little things about you and I can’t help it. And I do really like your family.” Quinn rushes all the words out in one go. 

Rachel stands from her desk chair.

“I just need...slow and steady right now.”

Rachel says confidently, “I can do that.”

“Can I kiss you?”

“Shouldn’t that be my line?”

And they do, sweetly. 


End file.
